Preferences did not copy over to new Windows machine

Software
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I replaces my ten year old Windows 10 machine with a new Windows 11 machine. I installed KiCad Version 8.0.9. I brought over my directory from another Windows 11 machine that runs the same KiCad version. This directory had all my projects in it, my schematic lib, my PCB lib, and my 3D models.

In ‘Preferences’ I set up the Config Paths, Symbol and Footprint library paths. I can load and see all my old projects, all symbols/footprints/3D-Modles load correctly.

The problem is the settings in the ‘Preferences’ setup (the one with the red gear on the left) are the Version 8 colors, styles, etc. On the other machine, I had set them back to the Version 6 style/colors. Not sure why Schematic and PCB layer colors changed in V8, this kept me from upgrading for a few years…

I was under the impression that the Preferences for a given design were stored in the folder that had the project files. I can’t find in the manual a good explanation of where this lives. The text %APPDATA% is used in the manual, not sure of what that expands out to in the Windows world. On both the existing Windows 11/KiCad V8 machine and the new machine, the directories in ‘Environment Variables’ for the KICAD_USER_TEMPLATE_DIR are the same, and they point to empty directories.

I do have a template project I use to load up my preferred settings when I start a new board, that works well. And boards stored on any new project have kept my preferred Settings. This is because I have not figure out how to make the default settings persistent.

From other forum posts, it seems there is no clear way to export Settings and the load Settings as a global default when making a new project. Going through some 75+ PCBs and manually editing the preferences would not be fun.

Any advice on next steps to get the Preferences back is apricated.

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The kicad settings are stored in: c:\Users\your_login_username\AppData\Roaming\kicad\8.0\

Note that the Appdata folder is a hidden and/or system folder (at least my filemanager shows that folder as “special”).

Not sure about v8, but at least kicad v9 presents a button “open preferences directory” in the global preferences dialog.

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Yes, Also in V8.0.9 (Which is what I am still using).

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On my Linux box, 7 of the files in KiCad’s configuration directory have today’s “modified” date. So if you change those preferences in one project, the others probably have those same settings.

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That is the missing piece. I brought that directory over from the Windows machine that was the “source” for the new machine, and the settings are back.

In the Windows File Explorer, when you click the “Open Preferences Directory” button, it shows the users account in C:\Users\ but the displayed path just starts with the users name. It does not show the “full pathname”. Not a biggie, a 100 mS brain delay for me.

So to copy a working KiCad system on one Windows 11 machine to a new one, after installing KiCad you need to bring over your libraries (for me it was schematic symbols, foot prints, and 3D models) and the add their paths in the “Preferences” section.

Then, use the “Open Preferences Directory” (as paulvdh was kind enough to show) and bring over that directory in the path shown. I also just re-named the final “8.0” directory in case I wanted to go back to the “new > V6” defaults.

Thanks to both of you for your help.

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